tea break
1
1.3
- noun
- UK
:
pausa para el té
- Let's take a short tea break to relax and enjoy some refreshments.
- take a tea break
Examples
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Tea break!
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Don't they know Sylvia's on her tea break?
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Shall we take a tea break?
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We now have a coffee break, or tea break.
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An early tea break for you all.
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Perhaps we should take a bit of a tea break, eh?
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Donal, we're after missing our tea break.
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I loved that we all ate lunch together at essentially the same time to just chat, and we also had a tea break at 3 every afternoon together.
Blog text (5) -
At 11:00, you'll have a tea break.
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After working for a few hours, everyone gathered for their tea break.
Synonyms
∞
1.0
A short rest from work or activity
20
1.0
A short break from work to drink coffee or eat a small snack
1
3.0
A short break to breathe and rest
A short pause to use the toilet or have a brief rest
How Long
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a short, informal rest often taken to drink tea' is directly and predictably formed from 'tea' (the beverage) modifying 'break' (a short rest). This straightforward compositional pattern is common cross-linguistically and follows normal English noun-modifier structure, so a B1 learner who knows both words will readily infer the meaning.
Etymology
The phrase tea break comes from old workplaces where people stopped work for a short time to drink tea. Because this short break became a regular time to rest and talk, today tea break means 'a short, informal break from work', often to have a drink.